Genome Wide Identification of Dof Transcription Factor Family in Pepper

The Dof (DNA binding with one finger) family is a plant specific transcription factor family. These transcription factors are involved in a variety of biological processes such as light, phytohormone, seed development, germination and defense responses. In this study, we identified 33 putative Dof genes in pepper genome sequence (Capsicum annuum ‘CM334’) and these CaDof genes were divided into four classes. Twentyfive motifs were found based on Dof amino acid sequence alignments. The 26 genes out of 33 putative CaDof genes distributed on eight chromosomes. We performed a comparative phylogenic analysis between Dof family genes in Arabidopsis, rice and tomato. Phylogenetic analysis showed that these Dof genes divided into four groups, similar to those reported for Arabidopsis, rice and tomato. This is the first step of analysis of Dof family in pepper and provides a useful information for cloning of functional analysis of this transcription factor family in pepper.